You may want to check out the book list:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/wiki/books/europe#wiki_ancient_rome

It's on there twice, for the republican and early imperial periods, with recommendations from both myself and u/UndercoverClassicist

SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome by Mary Beard (2015; ISBN 978-1846683800) Entry-Level - A very accessible overview of Roman history, written by a very well-respected scholar of especially the Republican period. Beard’s chapters on the early history of Rome show a useful approach to using the problematic literary and mythological sources, treating them primarily as evidence for later Romans’ attitudes towards their own origins. She is explicit about what we can say securely and what is more fragile inference from the literary tradition, and useful to see how this material can be successfully handled. - u/UndercoverClassicist

And mine

SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome by Mary Beard (2015; ISBN 978-1846683800) Entry-Level- An eminently readable and entertaining, thorough and reliable general history of the Roman Republic and early Roman Empire. Mary Beard is one of the few well-known popular historians who also has impeccable academic credentials, and it shows. This book not only provides the usual high-level overview of political history, emperors and generals, but also pays a lot of attention to social history and the way the ancient Romans thought and saw the world. At least as notable and valuable is the attention it pays to the history of Roman history: not in an academic historiographical sense, but by examining the way Western society through the ages has used and re-interpreted the Roman past for its own purposes. As a high-level overview for the interested layman it is not quite up to date on the latest research, and as a work of synthesis it won’t offer much in the way of new insights to the expert, but it is excellent at what it does. Highly recommended to anyone looking for a general introduction on the Romans who does not know where else to start. - me

It is a well written book by Mary Beard, however my opinion is that it is not recommended reading for a newcomer with no knowledge of Roman history.

My reasoning is that a) it is not a chronological account of Roman history, regularly dipping back and forth along the timeline, and b) it requires you to have some previous knowledge of history, as it's not in the habit of explaining the fundamentals.

So therefore, I recommend it for people who have a cursory knowledge of the Romans, a basic understanding of the three eras of their history, from Kingdom to Republic to Empire. It's a good book for those readers who want to delve deeper into the essence of the Romans and Beard's take on what made them tick, what made them rise and fall. (though bear in mind it doesn't go all the way to the end of the Western Roman Empire. I believe it only goes up to Caracalla)

For a newcomer this book could be too overwhelming and unsatisfying for its habit to jump around the timeline.

As an example, the first chapter of the book is devoted to the Catiline Conspiracy. This would be akin to a book about US history having the opening chapter be about the JFK conspiracy.